


I'll Get to It When I Get to It, OK?

by gallopingmelancholia



Series: We're doing our best, fuck off [2]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic Fluff, Eddie Kaspbrak Gets Divorced, Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, Everyone Goes To Therapy, First Time Blow Jobs, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Medical Trauma, Sonia Kaspbrak's A+ Parenting, being an adult is hard, no beta we die like men, oh my god they were roommates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:54:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24492349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallopingmelancholia/pseuds/gallopingmelancholia
Summary: “Has he said anything to you about it? If he’s, you know, like?” Eddie feels stupid but can’t say the word. Because if he says it about Richie he’s probably going to have to say it about himself and that’s some shit he’s been avoiding pretty much forever and he just wants to go to sleep right now.“No, he hasn’t said anything yet," Mike says.Yet?It’s hard for Eddie to make eye contact at the moment, so he doesn’t. “I don’t know. It’s just. It’s, like, a thing. I don’t know.”**Eddie's POV during It's Hard to Tell Sometimes. He recovers from his injuries and learns to be honest. Kind of. In a roundabout way.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Series: We're doing our best, fuck off [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769347
Comments: 9
Kudos: 195





	I'll Get to It When I Get to It, OK?

Unbelievable pain breaks through Eddie’s back and out his front like a wrecking ball. But it’s not that, it’s some fucking claw thing protruding from his chest, and now he’s flying through the air, and he vaguely hears Richie whimper his name before he’s tossed aside and lands and crumbles into an oozing pile of viscera. _I guess I didn’t kill him after all,_ he thinks. _Now the others are going to have to deal with this. Sorry, guys._

He brings a hand up to assess the damage to his torso. The contact between his organs and the air stings, but putting his fingertips on the wound is fucking unbearable. He does it, though. He has to stanch the bleeding. _Oh I’m definitely dying_. He’s read enough Web MD to know that you don’t come back from something like this. It’s almost calming, to know it’s finally here, after a lifetime of looking over his shoulder every five seconds to see if and how it was coming. _Showtime showtime._ It’s just as bad as he’d thought it’d be, and he'd thought it was coming about once every half hour this weekend alone. He wishes it had been strangling this time, like back in the pharmacy basement rather than thi—

_You’re fucking kidding._

Clarity strikes him like a lightning bolt. The breakthrough he just had is stupidly easy to explain to the others; it was so obvious, how hadn’t they seen it before? Mike seems excited to finish the ritual and end it all, but Richie looks like he’s going to puke at the mere suggestion of it.

“You guys do that, I’m getting Eddie the fuck out of here,” Richie says.

That’s pointless, he’s going to be dead in like five minutes, and he’d rather not go through that water again. How’s he going to climb up the ladder to get into Neibolt house? That sounds fucking exhausting and painful. “Richie, no, it—“

“Shut the fuck up, it doesn’t end this way, now let’s go.”

Eddie has never seen Richie this upset. Eddie is practically calm compared to Richie’s barely contained hysteria, and that’s a new sensation, being the calmer one of the two. He’s had a lifetime of placating his mom and his wife, so he instinctively does the same for Richie.

“You guys finish him,” Eddie says. “We’ll be fine. Go.”

The others dart away. Eddie doesn’t want them to watch him die, no matter how much he loves them. And he does. He’s never been so enveloped in pure affection like he had these past two days, between the incidences of pants-shitting terror he’s felt. Richie gingerly helps Eddie stand up. Eddie screams from the pain.

He takes a step and feels a little bit more of his insides jiggle until they’re on his outsides. _This fucking sucks, holy shit._

“How do I help? You know everything about first-aid, I know you know how to fix yourself, just tell me what to do,” Richie says, holding Eddie up by the armpits. _Actually, I never planned to be fucking impaled, jackass._ Still, the same principles as other wounds probably applied.

“Stop the bleeding,” Eddie says, hissing out a pained breath.

“How?”

“Bandage. Pressure on the wound.”

“Will my jacket work? It’s all I’ve got.”

“Sure, whatever.” Eddie is already feeling faint. Richie gingerly presses the jacket against Eddie’s chest and Eddie nearly collapses from the pain again.

“I’m definitely going into shock,” Eddie observes.

“Don’t do that! How do I stop that?”

“More pressure. Take off your belt and wrap it around the jacket as tight as it can go.”

Richie does it. Eddie screams again, even though he’d been trying to be strong. It’s harder to get his breath back. He needs his inhaler. He shouldn’t have burned it.

Eddie gets a decent amount of the way through the tunnels before he needs to sit down again. He’s very proud of himself. _What should my last words be?_ It’s kinda nice that Richie will get to hear them. He’s always liked Richie the best.

“Nope, up we go,” Richie says, and slings Eddie over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. It’s the single most agonizing thing that’s ever happened to him in his life. His muscles didn’t react to being pierced and ripped to shreds immediately, he only realized the pain when he saw the claw sticking out his front, but he’s fully cognizant of what’s wrong now and how much it hurts.

“I fucking hate you,” Eddie screams. “Put me down.”

“Yoga breathing, Eds, come on,” Richie says, taking a few cautious steps forward.

“I can’t fucking breathe like this, fuck you,” Eddie says. He tries to take a deep breath but it hurts too much. Shallow wheezes are easier. He goes with those and hugs the jacket to his chest tighter. _Like, honestly, I can just die if it’ll stop the pain, I’m fine with it._

“I’m lucky it’s not your mom I’m having to carry out of here,” Richie says.

“Dude I’m literally dying, can we not do the fat mom jokes?”

“You’re not fucking dying. I’m gonna get us out as fast as possible so I can put you down and we can go to the hospital. You love the hospital, it’s your favorite place.”

“I think I’m gonna black out,” Eddie says.

“No, no, stay awake,” Richie says, moving faster, almost running. He’s trying not to jostle Eddie too much, keeping his knees low and his body rigid, like he’s a waiter carrying heavy trays down stairs without spilling a drop, but Eddie’s organs feel like they’re rattling around like maracas. Definitely some broken ribs in there. Sternum too, probably. His lungs are probably full of blood by now.

Eddie moans when they hit the graywater and Richie has to sling Eddie down to carry him bridal style through the water so his head stays above the surface. It doesn’t hurt as much this way. Rather, it hurts in new and exciting ways. Raising his arms above his shoulders to wrap them around Richie’s neck is torture. He can feel himself drifting off against Richie’s chest a few times, but he’s brought screaming back to consciousness when Richie again puts him in a fireman’s carry to take him up through the house. _This better be fucking worth it._

“Almost there, buddy, we’re almost there,” Richie says. He’s panting too, barely able to get the words out.

“Extremities are getting tingly” Eddie mumbles. “Blood loss.”

“That’s right, just keep talking. What else is happening?”

“You’re gonna drop me,” Eddie says. Richie is struggling to climb up the ladder built into the tunnel walls to get them up through the house. There’s some kind of horrible noise back the way they came.

“The walls are shaking,” Richie says.

“You couldn’t even climb the rope in gym,” Eddie says. “Why did you think you could carry me out?”

“What did you say? I didn’t understand you,” Richie says, sounding a little more panicked. ”Eddie, sweetheart, you’ve got to stay awake.”

_Aw, sweetheart. He should call me that more._

“I have to tell you something, Richie,” Eddie says.

“What do you have to tell me?” Richie asks, still struggling up the ladder. He accidentally jostles Eddie so violently Eddie blacks out from the pain. He comes to on the lawn of Neibolt. Richie is kneeling on the ground and holding Eddie around the abdomen, putting more pressure on the wound. The house is collapsing. The world probably is too, who knows at this point?

Richie is screaming indistinctly, frantically. Someone’s grabbed a hold of Eddie’s hand. Bill. He’s saying something but Eddie can’t figure out what it is at the moment. Then he’s being lifted again.

“Richie?”

“He’s right here, he’s right here,” the person carrying him says. _Oh, it’s Ben. He made it out, good for him!_

Ben gently places Eddie in the backseat of some car. There are fast food wrappers and half-empty Gatorade bottles all over the floor. _Gross._ But Richie is in the car, tenderly placing Eddie’s head in his lap. The door slams and it fucking hurts, and Ben is scrunched up under his legs, trying to keep them still so he doesn’t hurt Eddie more. An abrupt movement of the car makes him slosh forward. Richie catches him and pulls him close to his chest so he doesn’t fall into the back of the seats or onto the floor.

“Jesus, Mike!” Richie yells. Eddie rolls his head around. Mike is driving, and Bill and Bev are squished into the front seat, looking behind them at Eddie. They’re crying. _That can’t be good._

“Whose car is this?” Eddie asks.

“Fuck them, who cares?” Richie says.

“Am I still bleeding?”

“Nope, you’re good, we stopped it,” Richie lies.

“This ambulance sucks,” Eddie says, and Richie doesn’t laugh. He tries something else. “Richie, I have to tell you.”

“What is it?” Richie asks.

“Look at me,” Eddie says. Richie does. There’s blood on his glasses. “I fucked your mom.” And Eddie laughs so Richie will too. It fucking hurts.

Richie doesn’t laugh. He sobs. “Mike, are we almost there?”

“Two minutes.”

“If you stop for that red light I swear to god.”

Mike speeds up and blares the horn for an eternity. Eddie’s immediate reaction to a car horn is to shout “Fuck off” but he thinks he’s done talking for now. He’s starting to feel seasick from the motion of the car. Another abrupt stop. He blacks out from the pain again. He wakes up on a gurney, just long enough to see Richie’s face looming over him. He hopes it’s not for the last time and loses consciousness.

*

Fuzziness. Blurry.

 _Why aren’t my eyes working_?

_Oh, right._

He blinks a few more times.

_Well, I’m not dead, that’s pretty cool._

A machine’s breathing for him. _Hospital. Where’s Mommy? Oh, right. Where’s Myra? Oh. Shit. She’s back in New York. I’m in Derry. Where’s Richie?_

Eddie rolls his head around on his pillow, or tries to, anyway. It hurts. He’s not going to do that again. He tries to call for someone, but there’s something intruding in his throat and that hurts too.

A nurse notices he’s awake, though, and summons a doctor. Eddie tries to glance around the room from his position in the bed, but he can only really see the ceiling and what’s in his peripheral vision. Looks like a curtain. And some machines. No people. No Losers.

_Where the fuck is Richie? Why didn’t they let him back here?_

_Oh. Right._

Only next of kin is allowed into a recovery room.

_Fuck._

A doctor enters the room. He says some stuff, Eddie tries to listen.

“Mr. Kaspbrak? Mr. Kaspbrak?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” he intends to say. Something’s still in his throat.

“Don’t try to speak, it’s OK. You’ve had an accident and have been in surgery. Do you know where you are?” Eddie nods his head yes. “You’re in the hospital in Derry, Maine. You’ve sustained significant injuries to your torso and abdomen, and there was quite a lot of organ damage. Luckily, your spinal cord is intact. That really surprised us. You’re safe for now. We can only take it hour by hour, but you’re doing much better than any of us thought you would be.”

Eddie’s kind of proud of himself. At least all that working out and eating right had been good for something.

“Your friends are in the waiting room. Five of them, I think. They’ve been here the whole time and are very glad you’re OK.”

Eddie takes issue with the description “OK.” He is very much not OK.

“Do you want to see them?”

Eddie nods.

“Is that woman out there your wife? The redhead?”

Eddie wants to laugh. _He’s talking about Beverly. Beverly’s here. Beautiful, smart, cool, tough Beverly._ She couldn’t be more different from his actual wife. He shakes his head no.

“You’re from New York, yes? Is your wife here in Maine?”

Eddie shakes his head no again.

“What about any next of kin?”

Eddie considers what to do next. He tests to see if he can raise his arms. It hurts like a motherfucker, but he can. He raises them to his face.

“The man with the glasses?” Eddie nods. “Is he your brother?” Eddie shakes his head no. What even is Richie? “Friend,” while technically accurate, isn’t really sufficient to get him back here. And it doesn’t cover the magnitude of their relationship. Whatever it is. It’s definitely not brotherhood. Eddie looks down at his hands. They’re covered in cuts and bruises he doesn’t even remember getting. His wedding ring was clipped off in surgery, to help with circulation, he guesses. _Bingo._ He wiggles his left ring finger, and points to it with his other hand. His right hand lands heavily on it. _Muscular coordination isn’t very good right now_.

“Your husband?” _Sure, let’s go with that. Close enough._ Eddie nods. “We’ll bring him right in.”

Finally, some small measure of relief. _Where are my ice chips? I want ice chips, my throat hurts and I’m thirsty, I got stabbed by a clown, I deserve some fucking ice chips._

_What’s taking so long?_

_Did they actually get Pennywise? What if the doctor is Pennywise? I think we got out of the house but that doesn’t mean they killed the clown._

_Richie carried me out of that house, holy shit._

_Seriously, where the fuck is Richie?_

_If he ever finds out about the husband thing, it’s gonna get real awkward. Hopefully he’ll just be cool about it. How big a risk was that?_

_How many fucking bandages do I have on? It feels like I’m wearing a winter coat._

_Where the FUCK is Richie?_

_Why is there a hole in my cheek? Oh right. Bowers. That fucking psycho._

_Seriously, I need Richie, why are they taking so long? They wouldn’t be taking so long if he were a woman. Homophobic. I mean, I’m not gay, but. Still. They don’t know that, they think I’m gay, still counts as homophobic._

_Long-ass hospital hallways. Gotta walk ten miles to get from the waiting room. Terrible design._

_I really hope Richie doesn’t find out about the husband thing. I shouldn’t have done that. I should call Myra._

_I’m not fucking calling Myra. I don’t want to call Myra ever again._

_If he finds out about the husband thing he might get weird about it and not see me again. Maybe. Probably not. I don’t know. Where the fuck is he?_

Finally, there he is. This doesn’t have the shock of the flood of memories swallowing him like it did when he saw Richie for the first time in 25 years at the restaurant. The achy swooping in his chest is far different this time. Feels like an incoming crisis.

“Hey, Spaghetti Head,” Richie says, and puts his hand in Eddie’s hair. _I hate when he calls me that, that asshole, he knows I hate that._ Eddie tries to say something about how much he hates it (he doesn’t hate it, actually, it’s comforting), but he’s got that damn thing in his throat. You’d think he’d remember.

The clown’s dead, thank god, and they’re not. They’re all alive. _Except Stan. Poor Stan_.

“Do you want us to call your wife?”

_FUCK THAT._

There’s no more blood or shit on Richie’s clothes. He must have showered. He looks exhausted. _How long have I been out?_ Richie offers to leave and bring back Bill. Leave. _FUCK THAT TOO._ He’s not leaving.

Richie almost touches his hand before pulling back. Disappointment wracks Eddie. Richie turns away. _What the fuck, man?_ Richie goes and washes his hands. Eddie understands, and he’s fucking crying now. Richie knows Eddie doesn’t like germs, so he gets rid of the germs before touching him. He’s still trying so hard. He dragged Eddie out of the sewers. If it weren’t for Richie, he wouldn’t be here. Gratitude doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Richie is back and grabs Eddie’s hand, so, so softly. Eddie lets loose and cries and cries and cries. Richie cries too, and actually wipes his tears for him. Eddie’s never felt this close with anyone before. They’re still holding hands. They never hold hands. Now’s a good time for it, considering.

This is the longest they’ve ever gone without saying something stupid to make it less weird between them, Eddie realizes.

“I beat that Pizza Rat game on my phone while we were waiting for you to get out of surgery.” _There he is. That’s the emotionally repressed idiot I know and love._ Ben and Bev are together now, finally, thank god. Richie brought him stuff he thought Eddie would need. _Very sweet._

Richie turns on and hands over his phone, so Eddie can write down any allergies and whatnot. Eddie doesn’t have any except cashews and pollen. He writes down an insult instead, and hands it over. It hadn’t worked back in the car, but for the first time since they remembered who Pennywise was, Richie stops looking worried. His laugh is almost unhinged, it's so loud and relieved. 

_There. That’s what I wanted._

Smiling hurts because it stretches out the wound on his cheek, but he does it anyway.

Richie has to leave now, the doctor says. Eddie needs to sleep. It’s true, he’s already exhausted, but fuck that, he wants Richie to stay. But Richie just leans over and gives him a kiss on the forehead, the one place that wouldn’t be painful.

“I love you, Eddie,” Richie says, and Eddie’s heartbeat doesn’t spike—he knows this because he can see it remain steady on the monitor—but it feels like it does. But then Richie backtracks. “We all do.”

_Of course we all do. That’s fucking obvious._

And he leaves. Eddie recognizes the sense of disappointment he felt when Richie added the other Losers into that exchange, separate from the disappointment of Richie walking out the door and his resentment against the doctor for making him do so. He files it under “think about that later” and drifts into sleep.

Being awake sucks so he doesn’t do it much over the next few days. It’s so much easier to sleep when he gets off the breathing machine—two punctured lungs, one of which had been fully collapsed, he fucking knew it—and gets a nasal cannula instead.

The other Losers have seen him by now. Ben and Bev came in first, and Richie’s right, they’re totally together now and it is very cute. Ben explains what they’d told the doctors had happened to Eddie so he can repeat it back to them. Even with Ben’s building expertise, it still sounds implausible, but he can’t exactly tell the truth there. Mike visits next. He comes alone, since Richie and Bill are back at the hotel showering. He tells Eddie how they bullied Pennywise until they could rip out his heart.

“Hey, what happened with Bowers?”

“He disappeared. I don’t know if he turned into ash like Pennywise did or if it’s like a Michael Myers thing or what, but he wasn’t there, and we haven’t had any trouble since.”

“Thank god. I’m glad he didn’t get you, we really needed you down there.”

“We needed _you_ down there. They could’ve done it without me but you were indispensable. You saved all of our asses.”

“I should’ve realized sooner. Would’ve saved me a fortune.”

“Do you have good health insurance? Is this gonna be out of network?”

“It’ll be fine. But I need you to help me do something that’ll also be really expensive. But you can’t tell anyone, OK?”

“Whatever you need, I’m your man.”

“I need you to stand guard outside the room. And if anyone comes in, you redirect them. Especially Richie.”

“Why?”

“I need to make a phone call.”

“No problem.”

 _Mike’s the best._ “Thanks, man.”

Eddie calls Myra. It is…unpleasant. She really doesn’t take the words “accident” and “ICU” well at all, but it’s the word “divorce” that sends her into whiny screaming mode that she only saves for very special occasions. By the time he manages to get her off the phone, Mike’s visiting time is nearly over.

“I’m sorry to make you do that,” Eddie says.

“I’m sorry that it happened, that’s a lot to go through while all this is going on too.”

“It’s actually a huge relief,” Eddie says. The possibility of leaving Myra had been lurking in the back of his mind since the first time she’d called him “Eddie-Bear” and it had made Eddie’s anxiety spike up for no reason he could identify. Even he was self-aware enough to know pet names shouldn’t invoke a fight-or-flight response. Looking back, that was some repressed Oedipal shit left over from his mom he never got to resolve because of the clown-induced amnesia. His therapist would be relieved to know that he did in fact have concrete memories of his mom now. Talking about that with her’s gonna be a nightmare. But she’d be proud of him. Dr. Akopian had helped him see what lay behind Myra’s behavior—the compulsive eating, the cycles of increased exercise followed by barely moving for a week, the desperate need for control—but actually confronting her about it, that was something he hadn’t worked up to yet. Figuring out Myra’s problems was a buoy he could grab onto to hold him up when he was too tired of dealing with his own, like controlling his anger and paranoia and anxiety and hypochondria and uneasiness with authority figures. Now he’s gonna have to talk about sex with Dr. Akopian and she’s going to force him to do something good for him. No matter how many times she helps him through something, he’s always scared the next time.

( _You’re braver than you think._ Richie had said that to him so Eddie javelined a demon clown with the belief that he could do it. And it almost worked! He can talk about his feelings in everyday life. Right?)

“You don’t have to answer this, but why was it so important that Richie not hear?”

 _Aw fuck._ “OK, if you tell anyone this I will fucking kill you and you know I can do it, I did stab a guy and I liked it and will do it again.” Mike laughs. “The doctors think Richie is my husband.”

Mike is hard to surprise, but Eddie’s done it. His eyebrows go up very high. “Um.”

“I was high off my ass on pain meds, which weren’t working, by the way, and wanted to see him to thank him for saving my life and they only let next of kin back here so I improvised.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah and I don’t want the others to know so if anyone asks, make something up, I don’t care.”

“Is that legal? You’re not supposed to lie about stuff like that.”

“I don’t know! Who cares? What are they gonna do, take me to court?”

“He did put himself down as your emergency contact,” Mike says. “So that cover story can work.”

If, before all this, you’d asked Eddie if he’d want Richie as the person to contact in an emergency, he’d have said no, Richie can’t handle that responsibility. But Eddie was clearly wrong and now no one else is going to get a call, at least as long as he’s in Maine.

“What did he put under ‘relationship’?”

“No idea.”

“I’ve got to update that form. I’m gonna put fiancé and tell them he’s like, shy or closeted or hates doctors or whatever and tell them to just talk to me about everything instead. If they find out about Myra I can just say we’re legally separated.”

“That could work.” Mike pauses and Eddie braces himself because he _knows_ what’s coming next and he doesn’t have a good answer. “You don’t have to answer this, but, are you and Richie, like--? What’s up with that?”

“I don’t fucking know, man. I’ve got other shit to be worrying about.”

“Because it’s not really my place to say, but I think there’s something there with him. He was out of his mind yesterday. They offered him tranquilizers so he would stop getting up and pacing and driving everyone crazy and he said no because that shit always put him to sleep and he needed to be awake when they told us you were OK. And when they did he fucking _sobbed._ Just collapsed. And when you were kids you were always so close and you picked up right where you left off so I just kinda assumed--”

Eddie doesn’t know how to deal with that information, let alone how to respond to it. “Has he said anything to you about it? If he’s, you know, like?” Eddie feels stupid but can’t say the word. Because if he says it about Richie he’s probably going to have to say it about himself and that’s some shit he’s been avoiding pretty much forever and he just wants to go to sleep right now.

“No, he hasn’t said anything yet.”

_Yet?_

It’s hard for Eddie to make eye contact at the moment, so he doesn’t. “I don’t know. It’s just. It’s, like, a thing. I don’t know.”

“Well, one thing at a time. He’s already pretending like the whole thing is no big deal. Talk to him when you’re ready. Communication will make it a lot easier. Especially with him, you know how he is.”

And Eddie does know. One hour he didn’t know anything about Richie Tozier other than that he was good-looking and his stand-up was obnoxious and sexist, and the next hour he remembered Richie’s favorite ice cream flavor and that his stand-up was clearly written by someone much stupider than him and that he’d peed his pants in first grade. He also knew that it had been very important to his younger self that Richie was his best friend and that he was Richie’s best friend and he’d never really identified why that was such a sticking point with him.

“Thanks, Mike. And again, don’t tell him, or I will stab you.”

“Yeah, you’re a real threat right now,” Mike says, laughing, and then it’s time for him to leave. Richie and Bill are next. His heart does that inconvenient swooping thing when he sees Richie again, only this time it’s worse because of what Mike just said.

“Hi Bill. Hi Richie,” Eddie says. His voice is really scratchy by now. He’s glad he’s on morphine so it’s not sore. He’s always hated sore throats.

Eddie can see what Mike’s talking about. Richie’s face is doing some serious emoting right now. His glasses magnify the tears in his eyes. Richie’s also trying to be casual, like he doesn’t want to stress Eddie out. _That ship has sailed, my guy._

Bill’s stuttering is hardly noticeable now. The longer Pennywise stays dead, the faster it all melts away, he says. He’s probably going to be the one Loser who doesn’t have severe PTSD after this. It’s got to be a relief, to have your handicap resolve itself like that. Eddie’s is taking quite a bit longer.

But maybe the reason he’s still alive and healing better than expected is because the evil weight of Pennywise is no longer dragging him and the entire town of Derry down. He’s well enough to get his own room in less than a week.

On the one hand, it’s kinda nice to not have to be somewhere or do anything. He's avoided infection somehow, thank god. And since he’s got his own room and they think Richie’s his fiancé, Richie’s with him pretty much all the time, and that’s nice. He even sleeps on the little couch they have next to the window. Sometimes, to change things up, he’ll sleep in the visitor’s chair. Eddie will wake up in the middle of the night and listen to him breathing before falling back asleep. It’s calming. They’re making their way through _Game of Thrones_ , when Eddie’s awake. The show sucks more the longer it goes on, but they keep watching it. The gore is a little hard to take, considering. But he’s been meaning to watch it forever and now he gets references his coworkers made to it every Monday morning while he just stood there listening and not contributing to the conversation. Maybe next they’ll watch _The Sopranos._

On the other hand, though, this fucking _sucks_. The pain is constant, even with the meds. He hates how drowsy they make him. He has to have a colostomy bag and it’s humiliating and gross. Just lying around all day gets very old very quickly. He can feel his muscles getting flabbier, even as he loses weight from his liquid diet. He’s lucky because he hasn’t had to do invasive surgery again, just a small procedure here or there, but he’s got a hole the size of a Civil War cannonball in his torso. Changing the bandages sucks. The pus smells unbelievably bad and his skin gets irritated under the bandages, and he’s terrified he’s going to get bedsores. He can’t do a fucking thing for himself, Richie or the doctors do everything. It’s just as bad as he was sure it would be, and he was right to take a lot of precautions with his health his whole life.

Well, not _all_ of the precautions had been necessary. He’d been doing a lot of washing and vitamin-taking and sanitizing, especially before he met Myra, who complained about the smell of his various cleaners so he had to stop using them as much when they moved in together. And his therapist had helped too. He could walk past a garbage pile on the sidewalk and not feel like puking now. Letting someone borrow one of his pens wasn’t a big deal anymore. He could probably even ride the subway if he needed to. Screw that, he definitely could. He mortally wounded a clown from hell and lived through not only being skewered but also the worst patient transport of all time, slung over Richie’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

The doctors had asked if he’d wanted to speak to a psychiatrist to help him get over any PTSD from the accident and losing mobility like this. He said no. He could just complain to Richie about the injury stuff, and if worse came to worst, he could talk to Mike about the _I might be in love with Richie, help me_ stuff.

He doesn’t talk to Mike about it, though, not after that first conversation. Mike doesn’t bring it up again, thank god. Eddie discreetly pulled a nurse aside and fed them his bullshit story about Richie and asked her to keep it on the down-low. She assured him that a married man cheating on his wife with another man wasn’t even close to the weirdest family situation she’d seen at this job and that she thinks Richie is cute and they’re good together. Eddie tries to feel better but he doesn’t, really. He’s not _cheating._ Nothing’s _happened._ He just…kinda wishes something would. He watches Richie and he wonders what he would do if Richie ever put him in that sort of situation. He’s had guys hit on him before. He’s even made out with a guy once. It made him deeply uncomfortable. But then, he’d been scared before, and he still overcame that to stab a guy in the chest and launch projectiles at a hell clown. So who knows how he’d react if Richie did something other than say “Love you, bro,” whenever he left to go shower at Mike’s or when any of the Losers left to go home. (That’s a thing they do now, apparently. They just straight-up tell each other how they feel about each other instead of merely implying it. That’s new. Eddie’s been lying his whole life about that shit, now he’s just supposed to say it when it’s true? And accept it when people say it to him and actually mean it? It takes some adjusting to.)

When the pain gets really bad, Richie still holds his hand. He does everything Eddie asks with half as much bitching as he used to. When the colostomy bag finally gets removed, Richie helps him to the bathroom and then back to bed. He’s been in the room for some of Eddie’s sponge baths, even. He’s getting to be a pretty good caretaker, actually.

When he’s been in the hospital about two weeks, Bill visits for the last time before flying back to LA. He’s got to clean up some kind of mess with his latest film. They fired him and brought in a new screenwriter on his own movie, and there’s some kind of legal thing with his agent, or something. Richie’s showering and made sure Bill would be there until he got back so Eddie wouldn’t be alone. _It’s fine, Richie, I can be alone with my thoughts for an hour or two, unlike you._ But Richie had insisted. Whenever Richie leaves the room he gives Eddie that stupid fucking “get well soon!” bear he bought at the gift shop to sit and hold so he won’t be lonely until Richie gets back. Every time. Even when he just goes to the vending machine. It started as a joke but Richie keeps doing it, and now it’s essentially a ritual, Richie telling Eddie that he’ll be back soon. Sometimes he’ll even give a forehead kiss to the bear and Eddie before he leaves. The joke isn’t the affection or even the verbalizing of it; obviously Richie cares about Eddie, he hasn’t slept on a bed in weeks. The joke is the cheesy way in which it’s performed, as if they’re the kind of people who do over-the-top declarations of love because they’re insecure and want people to think they’re not. Like, for example, Myra, who constantly posted about how much she loves “her hubby” on social media and called back to demand he tell her he loves her if he didn’t say it while hanging up. Richie doesn’t do shit like that with the ones he cares about. He’s not a friendship bracelet kind of dude. So the bear thing is _ironic_ cheesiness.

“I was wondering, are you going back to New York when you get out of here?” Bill asks awkwardly. “I mean, I don’t want to pry or anything, but I can’t help but notice that Myra isn’t here.”

“We’re separated. I’ll have to get a new apartment, I haven’t really thought about it much,” Eddie says, lying. He’s been looking for single bedrooms that he could afford with elevators, in-building laundry, and parking nearby. It’s the worst. NYC real estate is the worst. He makes good money and has great credit and it’s still the fucking worst. (His credit is going to be _shit_ now, due to the hospital bills. Thanks Pennywise, you fucking dickface.)

“Audra and I have a spare room,” Bill says. “I’d like it if you moved in with us for a while. If you want. Until you get back on your feet.”

“Bill, that’s so nice of you, but I can’t accept that offer. I wouldn’t put you out like that.”

“It would be no trouble. I’d love having you there. And Audra’s great, you’d love her. And if you didn’t, she’s gone a lot filming so it wouldn’t matter.”

“Thank you, but no, I can’t.”

“The offer stands. I know you can take care of yourself, but you’re my friend and I want to help.”

“You’ve helped so much already. But if I’m ever in LA I’ll stay with you and visit.” This was also a lie and they both knew it. But he can’t just outright say, ‘Sorry Bill, but I like Richie better so if I’m in the city where you both live, I’m staying with him.’

“I’m looking forward to it,” Bill says. When Richie arrives, freshly showered and in another one of his dumb “retro” pop culture t-shirts he bought at Target because he didn’t pack enough clothes to stay in Derry for longer than a weekend, Bill gives them both a kiss on the cheek and tells them he’ll see them later. Bill gives Richie a tight hug, and Eddie’s jealous of both of them. It’s been forever since he’s had a good hug. Damn his broken ribs.

Ben and Bev leave the next week. They’re going to live in Ben’s place in Austin until Bev’s divorce comes through, and Ben wants to know if he and Richie will want to visit him and Bev sometime. Eddie coughs when she says the D word, and she and Ben make eye contact and Eddie can’t tell what the fuck they’re saying to each other wordlessly but it’s something, because Bev narrows her eyes first at him, then at Richie. She places a hand on Ben’s wrist to tell him to wait a second, and asks Richie if he wants to get some more ice chips for Eddie. Richie’s too busy patting Eddie between the shoulders to hear the question so she has to repeat it, but yeah, and he’s out of soda anyway, so they leave. Bev gives a significant glance to him and Ben over her shoulder.

“Are you OK? That looked like it hurt.”

“I’m fine. I felt weird talking about it so Richie doesn’t know I’m getting a divorce and I panicked and choked on my spit.”

“How doesn’t he know? You seriously didn’t tell him?”

Yes, this is a ridiculous situation he’s gotten himself into, he’ll fully admit it. “It never came up and he knows I don’t like it when he talks about her so I just changed the subject every time and then he stopped talking about her.”

“So what are you going to do when you get out? I thought you were going to live with Richie.”

“No! I’m getting a place in Brooklyn, I’ve been talking to a realtor.” (He hasn’t.)

“Are you going to get a home aide? Who’s going to help you with your PT?”

“I don’t know yet, maybe.”

“Listen, come live with me and Bev, we’d be overjoyed to have you. I’ve got a nice pool, fast wifi, the building’s accessible. It’ll be fun.”

“I appreciate the offer, it’s so, so sweet, you two are the nicest people in the world, but I can’t intrude on you like that. You’re in a new relationship, it’d be weird.”

“It wouldn’t be weird!”

Richie’s high-pitched laugh travels down the hallway. “They’re coming back, shhh. I love you, but no, and shhhh.” Bev and Richie walk back into the room with a pitcher of ice. Richie’s got a Three Musketeers that’s nearly gone already. “Yeah, I think that’d be fun, a Losers reunion at Ben’s place, wouldn’t that be fun, Richie?” Eddie says, playing it cool.

“Hell yeah, let’s do it.”

“Only when you’re ready. All healed up. And whatnot,” Ben says. _What’s ‘and whatnot’ supposed to mean? Hey Ben, what’s that supposed to mean? Stop looking at me like that. You don’t know shit, Ben. This isn’t like you and Bev._

She and Ben say their “I love you”s and goodbyes to Eddie and Richie—Richie gets TWO extra long hugs this time, the lucky bastard—and they leave. Eddie gets a text five minutes later from Bev.

Bev: You seriously didn’t tell him you were getting divorced?

Bev: Unbelievable

Eddie: I didn’t tell anyone, really. How did you even know?

Bev: Ben just told me

Bev: But I already knew bc I asked Mike why Myra wasn’t here and he said you asked her not to come and don’t talk about it bc you’re already stressed out

_Oh god. What else did Mike say? I can’t ask her that, she’ll know I told Mike not to say something._

Bev: What kind of Three’s Company Jack Tripper bullshit are you on?

Eddie: It’s personal, we don’t talk about shit like that

Bev: Eddie. He is your best friend in the world and you don’t talk about something as huge as a divorce?

Eddie: No

Bev: But you told Mike

Bev: And me. And Ben

Eddie: Yeah

Bev: But not Richie

Eddie: We don’t talk about girl stuff, we never have.

Eddie: I don’t talk to Richie about a lot of stuff, I’m a private person

Bev: That’s not healthy

Eddie: Yeah I know

Bev: If you need someone to talk to about divorce, I’m your gal

Bev: And you’re going to need someone, it’s hell

Bev: Do not keep that shit bottled up

Eddie: I won’t

Bev: Like you need an actual therapist

Eddie: I have one back in NY

Bev: And you still do this dysfunctional shit?

Bev: Eddie.

Bev: Honey

Eddie: Dude I know, don’t nag

Bev: I’m not nagging, fuck you

(He knows she’s not. He knows what nagging looks like. That was a low blow.)

Bev: But you should talk to him about it

Eddie: He’s gonna make dumb jokes about how much of a fat bitch she is and I don’t want to have to deal with it

Bev: True

Bev: But not if you ask him not to. He is capable of listening, you know

Bev: He does have a filter, even if it sucks

Bev: Honestly you should talk to him about your personal stuff too, it helps to get it out

Bev: And he’ll want to know. Talking is good for you

Eddie: Sounds fake but ok

“What are you angry-texting about?” Richie asks.

“Bev asked what episode of _Game of Thrones_ we were on and she said Littlefinger was hot.”

“Ewwwwww,” Richie says. “Tell her she’s disgusting.”

“Oh I did.” (He didn’t. Bev said no such thing at any point in their relationship.)

Eddie: If Richie ever asks you think Littlefinger from game of thrones is hot

Bev: Why on EARTH would I think that?

Eddie: Bc he asked what I was texting you about and that’s what I told him

Bev: EDDIE

Bev: WHAT THE FUCK

Bev: What is wrong with you?

Bev: First of all, talk about your fucking divorce and feelings with him

Bev: And second of all

Bev: LITTLEFINGER?

Eddie: I had to say something controversial and wrong, I panicked

Bev: LITTLEFINGER?

Bev: Why was he the first one you thought of?

Bev: Is this projection? Do YOU think Littlefinger is hot?

Eddie: Of course not, he’s skeezy

(A tiny, shameful part of Eddie thinks Littlefinger is hot. He will never admit this.)

Eddie: I’m more of a Jorah man (This is the truth.)

Eddie: Richie says your taste is terrible and next you’ll be saying you want to fuck the bald eunuch guy

Bev: Varys? Ask Richie if he wants to fuck Varys

Eddie: He says no. He says the White Walkers are sexier

Eddie: He says when they cum it’s probably like a slushie machine at 7-11

Eddie: Blue raspberry

Bev: OK beep beep Richie

Bev: I’m turning my phone off now

Bev: I can’t deal with this conversation anymore

Bev: You made me read that with my own two eyes

Bev: I will never forgive you

Bev: Talk to me in 27 years and we’ll see how I feel then

Bev: Ben is driving and can’t text but he’s making me tell you he says hello and he loves you both

Bev: He’s making me send you this [laughing cryface emoji]

Eddie: We love you too

Bev: [middle finger emoji] [heart emoji] [heart emoji] [heart emoji]

For the next week, whenever they watch _Game of Thrones_ , Richie sends a picture of Littlefinger to the group text with some comment on how Ben better watch out, he’s got competition, and Eddie laughs guiltily every time.

He’s finally released a week and a half later. They get a room at the Town House because it’s the only hotel in Derry, and Eddie specifically requests a room with two beds so a) he doesn’t accidentally get the room he was in when Bowers stabbed him, and b) he doesn’t have to try to sleep without Richie near him because he knows he’s not going to be able to. He has trouble falling asleep even in the best of circumstances. His pain meds are weaker and even though there’s much less pain to deal with now, it still gets uncomfortable and keeps him up. Richie’s breathing calms him. It’s sappy and pathetic but it’s true.

He’s told Richie he wants to see if he can make it around on his own for a bit before going back home, so he hasn’t booked a flight back to NYC yet. This is half true. He hasn’t booked a flight back to NYC yet, that’s true, but he just doesn’t want to go back and figure out what the fuck to do with the rest of his life. This is a transition period but he doesn’t know what he’s transitioning to. He needs a few days to figure it out, and he doesn’t want to be alone, and he doesn’t want to be without Richie and no, he doesn’t know what that means yet. Well, he does, but he doesn’t want to officially admit it to himself, so he’s going to pretend he doesn’t know so he can sneak up on the knowledge and acclimate himself to it. Like when you’re at the beach and the water’s cold. You go in slowly. In stages. Or if the knowledge that he was some flavor of queer and that he was also in love with his best friend were a deer, and if he sneaks up on it too quickly the deer will run away and then it’s gone forever, snatched back up by his psyche and then he’ll have to spend another 27 years being unhappy before remembering that, Oh yeah, he’s queer and in love with his best friend in a way he’s never been in love before. And by then they’ll be in their 60s and that’s way too old. So he’s going to ease into it. Just give him a few weeks, OK? 

Richie finally broaches the subject of the future after they’ve eaten their celebratory This Is Not Hospital Food!!!! Pizza. He is genuinely surprised to find out about the divorce. Eddie is unfortunately going to have to gaslight Richie about this one.

“Richie, you’ve been with me constantly for the past, like, month, how did you not know this?”

“I was avoiding the subject! I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable! I was being sensitive to your feelings!”

_Bullshit and we both know it._

There ensues a conversation about how much Eddie’s wife and mom were the same mean, ugly, borderline abusive person who nevertheless wanted Eddie to be safe and didn’t know how to do it in a healthy way. Eddie’s good at handling being uncomfortable now physically, but openly telling Richie about all the shit he’s realized since his arrival in Derry is almost as difficult as the first time he had to walk a hallway by himself as part of his physical therapy.

The conversation ends with Richie asking Eddie to move in with him until he can strike out on his own. Eddie puts up token resistance to the idea but the little wave in the tidal pool of knowledge that says ‘You’re waiting for Richie to ask you to move in with him’ has crept over his toes and is nearly up to his ankles, so he doesn’t have to pretend to himself that he has no idea that Richie would’ve offered.

There’s an absolute minefield of a moment when Richie says Eddie’s going to be the hot roommate in their new bachelor pad and Eddie, like a fucking idiot, says, “Yeah, chicks dig scars.” The point was supposed to be that he was hideously deformed now and no one’s going to want to deal with his medical issues, so he wants to take a break from dating, but Richie somehow gets the idea that Eddie’s trying to tell him that he’s queer and like, _NO. NOT YET._ That knowledge is reserved for when he gets chest-deep into the tidal pool at least. He’s not ready. He’s only at his ankles! His ankles!

The wild thing is that Richie looks disappointed when Eddie clarifies that he’s not looking for a romantic partner at all. But the idea that Richie is also in love with him and would reciprocate any and all feelings Eddie had towards him, that’s for when the water gets up to his eyes. Then he’ll be ready to deal with it.

Then Richie decides he’s not going to ease into anything, he’s going to just run straight into the surf and freeze his balls off and maybe he’ll knock Eddie to his knees while running past him so the next wave will slap him in the face because on the drive to LA he tells Eddie that he’s gay.

OK, Eddie instigated it. He’d pushed Richie on how bad his stand-up was and how much better Richie could do if he would just believe in himself long enough to put something original out there—if he did, then he’d see that he’s funny and smart and compelling enough on his own, he doesn’t have to rely on other people’s thoughts about what he should be saying. So Richie retaliates by taking control of the conversation and Eddie has to hand it to him, it’s effectively done, he is no longer talking about how great Richie’s art could be.

“I haven’t had a girlfriend in ten years.”

 _That’s impossible. Richie?_ Female sexuality is a mystery to Eddie, but he knows that awful, talentless, ugly, and mean guys get women flocking to them even when they’re not rich and funny and kind and only pretending to be boorish to get a laugh. He knows for a fact that Richie has a small but dedicated fanbase of women who talk about how much they want to bang him because he accidentally stumbled on it by clicking on a Twitter hashtag back in the Before Times. _Ten years?_ That’s way too long to be doing one-night stands and ghosting after a few dates, or whatever it is that single people do now. _Get it together, Richie._

“Uh, that’s quite a dry spell,” Eddie says awkwardly.

“I don’t even want a girlfriend.”

“Yeah, relationships are tough.” _Commitment is hard. You shouldn’t do it lightly. I should know._

“I don’t really, uh, like women. That way. I don’t do any of this stuff. With women.”

 _Oh lord. Jesus fucking Christ. The water's too cold, stop._ “Wait, are you like--?”

“Coming out to you right now? Yes. Don’t make it weird.”

“I’m not making it weird!” _YOU’RE THE ONE MAKING IT WEIRD._ Eddie’s social graces kick in. Richie is his friend and no matter how he feels about it, Richie’s making himself vulnerable to Eddie so Eddie has to meet him where he is and be supportive and freak out about what it means for him later. “Um, thanks for telling me?” _Is that what he needs to hear?_

“You’re the first person I’ve said it to.”

“Really?” _REALLY?_

“In as many words. I’m gay. See. Did it again.”

 _Oh so he’s like GAY gay. Just throwing it out there. He’s not going to pretend it’s like some ‘I’ll fuck anything with legs’ bit he’d been doing forever. He’s going for it, that maniac._ “That’s great dude, I’m honored.” It’s beautiful to be so trusted that Richie feels safe admitting something that he’s been hiding for so long. Eddie is genuinely touched that Richie wants to be open with him. He takes a short breath and says, “Do you like, want to talk about it?”

“Tell you all about my big gay journey? Nah dude, I won’t put you through that. I’ll save it for therapy.”

 _Oh thank god. I can’t hear about Richie having a crush on Bill or Mike or whoever. I don’t want to know about any other guy getting to have sex with Richie._ Plus, he knows that whenever some sort of shift happens, especially where Richie is concerned, he has to strike back with equal or more force so he can catch up and things can get back to normal. Richie can’t have the upper hand, and if he has the upper hand in this situation, Eddie’s going to have to get it back somehow, and he might do something drastic like admit that he thinks he’s bi and also, not to one-up Richie or anything, but he’s also in love with Richie. That can’t happen yet so Richie better slow the fuck down.

Richie does, even without Eddie saying “beep beep.”

Now that the conversation isn’t going to rush him any further into open water, Eddie can get his feet back under him. “Well, I’m proud of you, bro. That’s a huge thing to do. It’s brave.” And he is and it is. Lord knows Eddie isn’t brave enough to do it yet.

“Pffft. If I were brave I’d have done it years ago.”

“It’s never too late to try to be happy, dude.” _There, Dr. Akopian. I’ve passed on your words of wisdom. Can we end the session now?_

Richie has mercy on Eddie and makes a joke and the tension flies out of the car instantly. It’s easier to talk about it now. He hadn’t told any of the others, but Bill knows. That’s not surprising, since he spent that first night at the hospital with Richie and Mike said Richie was frantic. Mike knows, so Mike is the official secret keeper of the group, apparently.

Richie currently doesn’t have plans to come out publicly. Eddie gets that (boy does he get that) but he tells Richie he’ll have everyone’s support when he does. Because “people” love him.

They get home to Richie’s apartment in mid-September. It’s bigger than the apartment he had with Myra, but the walls are bare and the furniture is IKEA shit and there’s nothing in the fridge but beer and condiments. (Though perhaps the cleaning service Richie definitely secretly hired while they were on the road threw out all the expired stuff. Eddie doubts it. Richie doesn’t seem like a dude who cooks his own meals.) Maybe it’s because the apartment is such a blank space, but Eddie settles in immediately. He makes Richie go to Target and get enough dishes for two people, and extra bed sheets (Eddie changes his far more frequently than Richie does). He quickly finds the nearest Jewish deli so he can finally get a good bagel. He finds a doctor who can monitor his recovery and physical therapy, and they get his bandages and prescriptions so Richie can help with wound upkeep.

He establishes a routine: breakfast, physical therapy, shower, nap, lunch, cleaning, fucking around the rest of the day reading or watching TV or something, dinner, more fucking around, sometimes a walk with Richie out in the neighborhood, bedtime. It’s easier to maintain when Richie’s off during the day getting his career back on track in the face of his pre-Derry meltdown. It’s also really fucking boring. It’s not as boring as the hospital: he can move now, and exercise his legs (in a few weeks he’s able to ride the exercise bike in his room for several minutes at a time), and shower (god, he can _shower_! No more sponge baths!), and stay awake long enough to read a few chapters. The healthier he gets, the more exercise he does on the bike or easy yoga. Eventually he’ll move up to light weight training. It helps him pass the time and not be lonely while Richie’s gone. He sleeps better and pays more attention to his body, and he feels better. But it’s still really fucking boring.

After two weeks he bites the bullet and finds a cognitive behavioral therapist. He goes twice a week, just to get out of the house. He tells her about the “accident” and omits any supernatural elements to the story. They talk about his mom and Myra. And they talk about his sexuality. It’s like pulling teeth, getting everything out. He hates it. The therapist points out that it sounds like he’d had a crush on Richie when he was a kid, and Eddie tries to argue that it wasn’t true, but, like, she’s right. That’s what it was. It wasn’t the last (willfully unacknowledged) crush on a male, either. He’s just more comfortable with denial, is that a crime?

The water of the tidal pool of acknowledged truths rises quickly after that; it’s at his waist now. Soon it’s up to his wound (which is almost completely closed up by now, hooray!). Between the therapy and the noticeably better moods he’s in now that he’s living with Richie rather than Myra, he can admit to himself that he wants Richie. Like, wants him, wants him. Sexually. Romantically.

He finds himself staring when Richie walks around in just his boxers, which he does constantly. Richie’s physique isn’t even especially impressive, but Eddie can’t stop looking. It’s very distracting. Richie’s legs are what get him. The tan line from his shorts and swim trunks just above his knee where the light brown of his lower leg meets the whiteness of his thigh. The freckles on his wide shoulders and surprisingly muscular forearms. His strong hands. The stubble. Facial hair or a full-on beard would look terrible on Richie. Just awful. Neither of them have the butch masculinity or the suave charm required to pull off facial hair. But god, he wants to touch Richie’s stubble.

It gets harder to leave the living room to go to his own bedroom at the end of the night.

Richie’s been having nightmares. He had a few in the hospital but didn’t tell Eddie what they were about. Once he heard Richie talking to Bev about them. They were about the deadlights. She mostly talked about what she’d seen; he’d already spilled his guts, apparently, and he stopped talking when he realized Eddie was awake. But they’re more frequent now that Eddie’s not in the room with him. When they’re bad enough for Eddie to hear him mumbling or even yelling in his sleep, he shakes Richie awake, and they make a pot of coffee and sit at the table until it’s gone.

Once, Eddie asks him something he’s been wondering about. “Do you ever dream about the Stan-spider?”

“No.”

“Really? It nearly ripped your face off and I just stood there like a fucking coward.”

“Hey, stop it. You know I don’t blame you for that.”

“Yeah, but, like. I almost let you die.”

“So? You saved my ass immediately afterwards. I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t speared that asshole clown, I’d be catatonic.” Richie sounds downright offended that Eddie thinks poorly of himself. 

“Well, I still dream about it.” The guilt and shame of that moment haven’t left him yet. Hopefully they will.

“Really?”

“Yeah, dude, I fucking failed you and disappointed Bill and made Ben clean up my mess.”

“You don’t dream about the impaling?”

“Like, the moment of impact? No.”

“No offense but that’s insane. I see it all the time.”

“Might be, but I don’t. Sometimes I’m bleeding out in the graywater or in that rando’s car but mostly it’s the leper and you getting your face ripped off. Very occasionally it’s Bowers stabbing me in the face, but not as often as you’d think. Once it was when I broke my arm and the way Pennywise twisted himself out of that fridge. That fucked me up for a while as a kid.”

“Do you ever see the doors?”

“The regular scary, very scary ones? No.”

“Hm.”

He expects Richie to keep going, to describe his own nightmares, but he doesn’t that night. He does it a few days later, after a particularly bad nightmare, one where he actually woke up crying. That’s when he tells Eddie about what he saw in the deadlights. It’s super fucked up. No wonder it’s been tormenting him.

Considering the circumstances, they don’t celebrate Halloween. They’d both felt drawn to horror movies in a fucked-up, self-destructive way they didn’t fully understand in the amnesia days, but what happened in Derry is still too raw for them to seek out scary shit. Richie buys discounted candy on sale when it’s over and leaves wrappers where he knows Eddie will find them, replacing them in exactly the same spot after Eddie picks them up so Eddie will know he’s fucking with him. But there’s no malice. It’s teasing. Eddie’s in on the joke. He only complains because that’s his part of the bit.

The weird thing is that Eddie and Richie don’t argue. They bicker and banter like always, but the therapy must be working better for both of them (Richie admits he’s going too) because they can talk about routine domestic disagreements like adults now. They still bicker about inconsequential stuff, and their tone is always combative and competitive, but that’s just how they are. _It’s a functional relationship, bitches! The first in my life!_

Election night’s a trip. Eddie barely cares about politics and Richie doesn’t pay attention at all, so Donald Trump winning is a complete surprise, not unlike getting a call from Mike asking them to come to Derry. Most of Eddie’s coworkers voted for Trump, he’s positive. Economists and statisticians lean Republican, he’s noticed. He and Richie didn’t vote at all. They spent that day at the beach because Richie insisted that they weren’t going often enough and that sunlight was good for them. Eddie never takes off his tank top when they go. Ever. He’s not going to attract stares with the bandages or the bare, gnarly mass of scar tissue on his torso while he’s sunbathing. Fuck that. He doesn’t fully submerge himself in the waves, either, and yes, he recognizes the symbolism of that, considering the way he mentally pictures that tidal pool of acceptance of identity thing he does.

In any case, things are weird throughout November, and Eddie thinks Richie feels it too. The casualness of their friendship is sometimes forced, especially after post-nightmare coffees. Eddie's ribs are healed so they’re less careful about brushing past each other or sitting a respectable distance apart. Eddie can get hugs now! So between that and the physical therapy Richie still helps him with, they touch more. Quite a bit more. Richie will brush his teeth in the bathroom while Eddie showers. Eddie likes to take deliberately unflattering pictures of Richie and send them to the group text. They’ll leave notes on the dry-erase board on the fridge about things they need to remember to buy the next time one of them goes out. The increasing intimacy of shit like that is starting to make Eddie nervous. Once Richie slips up and calls him “sweetheart” when they’re drinking and it takes Eddie back to when they were climbing out of the storm drains. He has to pretend he needs to get up to go to the bathroom so he can breathe through the panic attack and come back and act like everything's normal. 

The divorce proceeds apace. He can’t fucking wait until it’s over and done with. New York is a no-fault state so he doesn’t have to prove that Myra was abusive or anything, they can just say it’s because of irreconcilable differences, which is good, because one day Myra calls Eddie and informs him that she would have claimed adultery if they’d had to.

“What the fuck, Myra? Who?”

“Eddie, please, I’m not stupid,” she says. “I know you’re cheating on me with that man.”

Meaning Richie. Eddie has to get up and walk around the room to avoid screaming at her. “I never cheated on you. Ever. And I’m not now.”

“You expect me to believe that?”

“Yes, because it’s true.” Her skeptical silence in response drives Eddie up the wall. “Stop, Myra, just stop. Just because Richie’s gay doesn’t mean we’re sleeping together.” _SHIT. Oh shiiiiiiiit. I should not have said that._

“That man is gay?”

Eddie doesn’t kick any furniture or punch a hole in the wall but he sure as fuck feels like it. He recognizes the tone in her voice. She doesn't need to use the word "faggot" because the disgust in her voice comes through clear as day. It's more genteel than the way Bowers would throw it at the Losers, but it's the same flavor of venom. “Yeah, so what? He’s my friend, I’ve known him since we were kids, I told you that. It doesn’t matter. Stop being homophobic.”

“So it’s a childhood sweethearts thing. Puppy love?”

“ _No._ ”

“I don’t believe you.”

 _That’s it._ “Believe what you want, you fucking bitch,” he says, and hangs up. He’s never spoken to Myra like that and it makes him feel guilty but he doesn’t take it back.

He tells Bev about it, though. Her situation is different because her husband’s a partner in their company and she’s not giving that up, she built that company and she’ll be damned if he gets any of it. And he’s physically abusive, not just emotionally, like Myra. But she gets what he’s going through better than anyone. He waits until Richie’s gone for the day meeting with his agent and lawyer the next morning to give her a call.

“Myra thinks I’m cheating on her with Richie,” he says immediately.

“Fucking hell.”

“I’m not, just to clarify.”

“I know, honey.”

“First of all, it’s not cheating if we’re separated because we’re broken up anyway so that’s shitty of her to say, and second, Richie and I aren’t fucking or doing anything. Strictly platonic.”

Bev pauses for a long time and well, he guesses she’s going to go for it, and she does. “Are you happy about that? About being platonic?”

“I mean. Not really.” _The water’s not all that cold now that I’m up to my eyes in it,_ he thinks. It’s kind of a relief to finally say it to someone other than his therapist.

“You should tell him.”

“Fuck no.”

“Eddie.”

“I can’t yet. I’m still getting used to being bi, I can’t just throw everything on the table.”

“You don’t have to be scared. You’re one of the bravest people I’ve ever met and you don’t have to be brave about this one, there’s nothing to fear from Richie.”

“Well, I am.”

“I don’t want to blow up his spot but Richie is obviously in love with you.”

“Not obviously.”

“Cut the bullshit. He won’t say anything but he is and has been for a long time.”

“Did he tell you that?”

“No.”

“Then you don’t know that.”

“Eddie, I love you and I hate seeing you like this. Why are you purposely keeping yourself from being happy?”

Eddie sighs. “Habit, mostly.”

“Eddie. Sweetie. Sugar. Muffin. That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I did love her once, you know. But that wasn’t really me, the full me. I didn’t have half of my memories. I didn’t have the Losers. If that dumbass clown hadn’t stolen my memories I’d have gotten over the gay crisis in college like a normal fucking person and never married her. I would’ve been like, ‘Oh, the reason she feels so familiar is that she’s literally my mom and I’m a classic Oedipus case or whatever’ and I would’ve realized that’s why I wanted to be with her. Like, I immediately felt comfortable with her because I spent so long living with that same shit, those same complex feelings with my mom, not because we worked well together. Because she also was trying to show she loved me, she was just too fucked up to do it right. She had her own reasons for being a controlling asshole and she shouldn’t have taken it out on me, but, like. Do you know what I’m saying?”

“Yes. Absolutely. You repeat what you know from your parents. If you’re lucky you figure it out in time and stop it if it’s fucked up. Like my dad. My husband was exactly the same. And deep down I knew it.”

“That anxiety, right? Underneath it all?”

“Exactly. And I think you should tell Richie how you feel. I know what it’s like, I did it to myself for years and years, and it’s worth it to take that leap and break that cycle.”

“It’s different for you.” Eddie’s throat closes up a little.

“Fucking, how?”

“Ben.“

“Ben’s no different—there is nothing wrong with Richie. Or you.”

“Ben’s touchy feely and shit, he talks about it without freaking out. We both freak out. That’s like, all we do. That's our thing.”

“You know what I’m going to say.”

“Communicate, use your words, etc.”

“Exactly.”

 _She’s right, I know she’s right._ “It’s hard.”

“I know it is. But it’s worth it. It’s so worth it.”

“Is being right all the time exhausting?”

“Yes.”

“OK, I’ve gotta go, Richie’s gonna be home soon and I need to go cry in the shower and then make dinner, it’s Taco Tuesday.”

“Cry it out, buddy. You’ll be fine. Enjoy your tacos.”

“Thank you, Bev. I love you.”

“I love you too, Eddie.”

Bill invites them over for Thanksgiving but Richie comes down with the flu and barricades himself in his room so Eddie won’t get sick too, so they miss it because Eddie is definitely not going to be the odd man out at a family party with Bill and Audra. Like, no way. Christmas is low-key too. No decorations or cookies or anything. They go to the movies on Christmas Eve and give each other very unromantic gifts like blu-rays or a framed poster or two. (He agonized over what to get Richie and ended up settling on a knife block and sharpener that Richie’s not even going to use because he sucks at cooking.)

The comedy shows that he missed while he was in Derry for his “family emergency” are rescheduled for the first eight weeks of the new year, and Richie says he’s going to drop in some original jokes instead of relying on the shittier ones he’d been using before. Eddie persuades him to do a Losers Club exclusive preview so he can iron out the kinks in his new routine. They can’t get their schedules to sync up until after Christmas, so Richie spends most of December fretting about getting the wording and timing exactly right and practicing Voices in the shower. It makes Eddie’s heart hurt to see him so insecure about something he’s great at.

Because he _is_ good. There’s a reason people like Richie despite his objectively bad jokes. They’re a lot funnier when he says them rather than when they’re written down somewhere. He’s got charisma. And when he writes his own material, he’s even better. The mini set he put on for the Losers was excellent, and Richie finally believed what Eddie had been telling him all along.

That night is an emotional roller coaster all around, though. Bill is there in person (Mike’s fulfilling his lifelong dream of traveling around the world, and Ben and Bev are still in Texas), and it’s so nice to see him in the flesh and hear his voice. But he tells Richie that Eddie chose Richie over his AND Ben’s offers to live with them, and that’s just not acceptable. _What the fuck, Bill? Be cool._

“Goddammit, Bill. Get that look off your face, Richie, I just didn’t want to be third-wheeling the entire time. Especially with Ben and Bev, they’re so gross. Like, all in love and shit.”

And Eddie could stab Bill for this because he refers to the huge gay elephant in the room. “Yeah, people in love. Gross.” And he looks right at Richie when he says it. Like he fucking knows that Eddie’s out of his mind in love with Richie and is going to actually _tell_ Richie about it. _NO. Only I get to do that._

And then after dinner, god, like a fucking idiot, Eddie tells Richie what Myra said. He’s got to see her in New York to sign the papers and arrange for all his stuff to be either sold or moved to LA to be put in storage, and Richie says he wanted to go with Eddie to do that, and Eddie says no, Myra wouldn’t be cool with that. And Richie asks why and Eddie, like a FUCKING idiot, says, “Uh no, she, um, thinks you stole me from her.”

Eddie hasn’t seen that look on Richie’s face since the Chinese restaurant back in Derry, all those months ago, right around the time the cursed fortune cookies showed up at the table and started crawling. “She thinks _what_?”

Eddie, as he always fucking does because he’s a sucker, defends Myra. “Well, I mean, I see where she’s coming from. I disappear for a month and ask for a divorce and move in with some guy.”

“But I didn’t—“

“Dude, I know.”

“How fucking high school is that? ‘My boyfriend’s not allowed to have other friends.’”

“Dude. I know. But she thinks it’s like a childhood sweethearts reconnecting thing.”

“You cannot be serious.”

“I’m dead serious.”

Richie looks like he’s going to hit someone with a baseball bat but also like he’s going to cry. Eddie can relate. “I’m sorry, I can’t get over this. She thinks—“

“Yeah.”

“Did you tell her I was gay? Is that why she—“

 _Fuck. FUCK. I’m sorry! I’m sorry!_ “Yeah. My bad, that wasn’t my secret to tell. I don’t think she told anyone, though.”

“That’s not what I was worr--Did you tell her you were straight so don’t worry?”

 _OK, I guess we’re doing this. Fully submerged._ Eddie cannot and will not look Richie in the eye for this. “Uh. No.”

“Are you?” falls out of Richie’s mouth like it was punched out of him.

 _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck._ “I don’t know, man. I’m still figuring shit out.” _You’re a liar, Edward Kaspbrak. You fucking pussy. You’re braver than this, fuck you._

“Hey, it’s cool. I get it. Shit’s complicated. God knows I’ve been through it. If you ever want to talk it out, I’m here.”

“I know.” _Tell him, you piece of shit._ He finally looks Richie in the eye. “Thank you.” _You’re braver than you think. Say it._

“I think we’re out of coffee beans!” Richie blurts out. “I’m gonna run to the bodega. Do you want anything?”

 _What the fuck, Richie?_ “Uh, no, I’m good.”

“OK cool, I’ll be right back.”

And Richie books it. He practically sprints out the door. Eddie can’t help it: he laughs hysterically. What an idiot. He loves him so much. That was so stupid that it looped back around and became insanely cute.

Eddie texts Bev: Omg Bev

Bev: What?

Eddie: So I told Richie what Myra said and that I’m bi and Richie just fucking RAN out of here

Eddie: Like a Looney Tune

Eddie: I’ve been laughing for 10 minutes

Bev: wtf

Eddie: You were right, he loves me, no one spazzes out like that

Eddie: The panic in his eyes

Eddie: He’s insane

Bev: You’re taking this very well

Eddie: Yeah dude I’ve got the upper hand here

Eddie: I thought I was the only one but he’s clearly gone and he can’t deal with it either

Eddie: I was ready to tell him

Eddie: I almost did and then before I could he was like WE’RE OUT OF COFFEE BEANS I GOTTA GO BYE

Bev: Oh my fucking god

Bev: Smooth

Eddie: We’ve got an entire can of coffee beans, Bev. He couldn’t even come up with a good excuse

Eddie: I just checked and he forgot his keys, that’s how fast he was out the door

Eddie: Hilarious

Bev: I don’t know if it’s pathetic or adorable

Eddie: It’s both

Eddie: I love him so much, oh my god

Bev: Thank god you finally said it

Bev: FINALLY

Eddie: Shut up

Eddie: I got there eventually

Bev: Are you going to tell him?

Eddie: He’s clearly not ready. I didn’t even say I was definitely into him, I literally said I was maybe bi and he freaked the fuck out

Eddie: If I told him how much I liked him he’d have a heart attack

Eddie: So I’ll wait. The ball’s in his court now

Bev: Good, he’ll get around to it

Eddie: Oh man, I’m going to enjoy this. I love it when Richie tries to lie about stuff, he’s so bad at it

Bev: You’re a bad liar too

Eddie: I’m an excellent liar

Bev: You’re so not

Bev: What have you successfully lied about?

Eddie: Myra believed I loved her for 15 years

Bev: Jesus, Eddie

Richie’s gone for like half an hour. Eddie’s surprised he even remembered to get the coffee beans. There’s a hot pot of coffee already waiting for him.

“You good?” Eddie asks, taking a sip.

Richie is still wired but trying to be casual and failing miserably. It’s so endearing. “Eddie, I am wonderful. How are you?”

“I’m peachy keen, Rich. You seem tense.”

“Well, you know, trying out new material. I had to go take a walk, rework it a bit.”

“Mmmhmmm. Do you want to talk about it?”

“Do _you_ want to talk about it?”

Eddie gives Richie a once-over and looks at Richie’s mouth, and Richie honest to god flinches. _Yeah, he’s not ready._ “Nah. We’ll let it percolate a bit more.”

“Stop laughing at me.”

“I’m not,” Eddie says, but he definitely is. _This fucking moron. I want to suck his dick._

“I’m trying to be a good friend, here. I don’t know how to be supportive. Like, what flag do I buy you?”

“I don’t need a flag, Pride’s not for like, seven, eight months. I’ll figure it out by then.”

“Or you don’t need to! It’s fine! You take as long as you need! There’s not a deadline!”

_He’s trying so hard. He’s been trying so hard this whole time. Bless._

“D’you want some coffee? I made a pot while you were out.”

“I would love some.”

*

Richie’s gone for two months and it’s unbearable. They haven’t spent a night apart since August. The decline in sleep quality he had when he couldn’t hear Richie breathing next to him when they moved to separate rooms is magnified a hundredfold when he’s out of state in some hotel and Eddie’s alone in the apartment. It’s even worse when he’s back in New York and staying in a shitty hotel and trying to figure out what to do with his furniture. He told Myra she could have all of it, whatever he left in the house, but she made him sit with the lawyers and go through the house piece by piece. It was torture. Sadistic. By the end of it he just gives her whatever she wants because he wants it to be done. She’s got a good job so he’s not going to have to pay much alimony, and he’s long since switched his assets to his own name rather than joint accounts. Like, years before Derry even happened. He’d been looking for a way out even then, he just wouldn’t admit it.

Mike times his first visit to NYC to coincide with Eddie’s trip there. It’s freezing and there’s nothing fun to do but Eddie takes him to see whatever Mike wants, including going to Ellis Island ( _why_ ) the Empire State Building ( _come on_ ), Times Square ( _nooooooo_ ), and walking across the Brooklyn Bridge ( _I hate you, I hate you, I hate you_ ). (It’s not true, he fucking loves Mike, and it’s the most time they’ve ever spent together, and he loves him more by the end of it.) Eddie sees more museums in the four days he and Mike are there than he did in the 18 years he spent there. They take the opportunity to visit local restaurants Eddie loves. The guys at his old deli are excited to see him and still remember his order. It reminds him of how much he loves the city, and it’s bittersweet to think of living in California instead. But then, he wouldn’t give up living with Richie for the world. This visit will be a goodbye to the city.

Mike flies to Las Vegas, and Eddie’s alone again.

He and Richie call each other pretty frequently. They hate being away from each other. Richie brought that stupid stuffed bear with him and takes pictures of it doing things like pretending to drink a pint of beer or smoking a joint or wearing a little hat because it’s actual winter where he is, not California winter. It makes Eddie ridiculously happy.

One night Richie slips up and suggests that they get a new apartment together. Two grown-ass men don’t live together unless they can’t afford to live alone or they’re a couple, and Eddie and Richie are both wealthy. Eddie’s doing fine even after the medical bills and lawyer’s retainer. (He argued the exorbitant medical bills down with the health insurance company because he’s got nothing but time on his hands so they can put him on hold as long as they want, and he likes a good argument with customer service reps, even though he knows he’s being an asshole. In this case, fuck ‘em, he’ll be as mean as he wants because he almost died but didn’t and they don’t get to push him around.) He’ll have to get a job soon, but he’s still got plenty in savings. They play it off awkwardly (“we’re just roomies, it’s fine” etc.) but it feels like a step forward. The customary goodbye “I love you” hits differently tonight.

He’s gotta find a way to occupy himself while Richie’s gone, because Richie’s tour lasts another five weeks by the time Eddie gets back to LA. He takes pilates classes. Ben texts him some good clean-living recipes so he makes some of those. He cleans the house more thoroughly than he’s cleaned anything since he lived with his mom just because he’s bored. He goes to the beach but it fucking sucks, he doesn’t even like the beach and it’s cold. He gets a library card. He does his taxes. He asks Richie if he wants Eddie to do his taxes but Richie's got an accountant and he has no idea where his money comes from or where it goes so that's Steve's call. _Oh my god, Richie._ He sees Bill way more frequently because he’d go nuts if he didn’t.

Once they’re getting lunch and Bill finishes describing the plot of his new book and Eddie’s texting Richie about something inconsequential and Eddie looks up and Bill’s doing that dumb face he does.

“What?”

“You’re adorable.”

“I am not, shut up.”

“What did Richie say?”

“How did you know I’m talking to Richie?”

“Your smile.”

“Ugh. Man. Stop.”

“You’re the one doing it, not me, I’m just pointing it out.”

“Fuck off.”

“Are you two going to do anything for Valentine’s Day?”

“NO. Fuck you.”

“You should get him something.”

“It’s not like that yet.”

“Yet?”

 _FUCK._ “Yeah, yet. And I wouldn’t anyway because he’s not even going to be back yet and that shit’s dumb and that was my anniversary with Myra so it’d be weird.”

“Your anniversary was Valentine’s Day?”

“I know, man. You don’t have to—“

“That’s so _lame._ What a cliché.”

“I didn’t pick it.”

“Obviously.”

“When’s yours?”

“September 11, 2000.”

“Oh my _god._ ”

“Yeah, it’s uh, it’s unfortunate. You want to know something hilarious?”

“What?”

“Audra’s due date is May 2nd, on the anniversary of the Osama bin Laden assassination. Bookends.”

“Morbid. Wait, dude, what?”

“Surprise.”

“You’re gonna have a baby?”

“I’m having a baby!”

Eddie jumps out of his seat and throws himself into a hug. “Congratulations! That’s terrifying!”

“I _KNOW._ I’m excited but Jesus.”

“Do you know the sex?”

“Baby girl.”

Eddie orders a bottle of pink champagne and takes a picture of Bill toasting with it and that’s how they tell the Losers. They’re ecstatic. Mike starts a separate group text without Bill and says to leave the baby books to him, and if anyone of them is that asshole who brings _Goodnight Moon_ to a baby shower, he’s going to hunt them down.

“You’re gonna be a great dad.”

“I’m gonna try.”

“That’ll make you better than most parents.”

“I’ll drink to that.”

Eddie spends his first wedding anniversary without his wife getting drunk and watching gay porn. It seems fitting.

Richie finally gets home a few days later. Eddie spends all day looking at his watch, including during his job interview. The interviewer thinks he’s an asshole but Eddie doesn’t care, he’s mainly there out of boredom. He doesn’t know exactly when Richie will arrive so he doesn’t know when to eat because he wants to get dinner with Richie. By the time he gets home, he’s starving. Richie’s lying on the couch. His shoes are still on, but who knows how long he’s been there, he’s the laziest person Eddie’s ever met. He doesn’t even get up to hug Eddie, so, fine.

“That painting is hideous,” is what he says rather than hello.

“Welcome back to you too, fuckface.”

It’s so _them._ Eddie’s at peace.

Richie notices that he’s been bulking up and it makes Eddie feel embarrassingly pleased. They squabble about what to order for dinner, and Richie hands over his phone to Eddie so Eddie can order them something while he showers. Eddie doesn’t use delivery apps. Fuck that. They sell your data to advertisers and their security is fucking terrible. No. Richie can use them, though, whatever. He can play fast and loose with his data and risk identity theft, it’s no skin off Eddie’s back.

Eddie gets halfway through placing the order before he realizes that he’s got Richie’s phone and he can change the ringtone to something horrible and embarrassing. He could make the lockscreen a dick pic. He could tweet something that’ll ruin Richie’s career. It’s very tempting.

He finally settles on giving the camera the finger and setting it as Richie’s background so it’ll take him longer to notice behind the icons. Sneaky. Subtle. But he fucks it up somehow because he can’t find the picture once he’s taken it, so he takes another and can’t find that one either, so he goes into Richie’s photo gallery. Something familiar catches his eye.

_Eddie, don’t snoop, you fucking creep, this is a violation of privacy, you goddamn hypocrite._

He does it anyway. He'll apologize later. He needs to know why Richie’s got a photo of a wooden bridge in his phone.

It’s a close-up so he can’t see exactly what the structure is, but Eddie knows that wood. That’s the Kissing Bridge in Derry. The photo is of the letters R+E carved into the Kissing Bridge. It looks like it’s freshly done, too, a new carving over an older, cruder one. Blood is pounding in his ears and rising to his cheeks. That’s…did Richie carve this? Why would he have a picture of graffiti on his phone if he didn’t? Is that Richie + Eddie? That’s gotta be. When did he do this? The hospital? High school? Middle school? How long has--?

The shower’s off. He’s got five minutes tops to get his shit together and figure out what to do with this before Richie gets back to the living room.

He’s gotta ask him, right? He can’t just let this one go.

He has to keep pressing the home button so the phone doesn’t go to sleep and he loses access to the picture. Every time he does and he sees it, he has trouble breathing all over again. The picture is dated late August. Eddie was still in the hospital, fresh out of ICU.

_Breathe, Eddie. You got this. You’re braver than you think._

Richie’s dressed and back and on the couch. He has no fucking idea what’s coming.

“Food’s on its way.”

“Thanks.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“What’s this?” He holds up Richie’s phone, and Richie’s face goes white.

“Oh fuck.” Richie stops himself from running out the door, but just barely. It’s not funny this time.

“Why were you going through my phone, Mr. Right to Privacy?” he says, trying to grab it from Eddie’s hand.

“I was gonna change your background to a shitty picture of me giving you the finger and couldn’t find it once I took it so I went into the gallery to see if I accidentally deleted it. R+E, is that Richie and Eddie?” Richie’s panicked noises are something to behold. Eddie almost feels sorry for him. “Did you carve this?”

“Um.” Richie retreats across the room, as if afraid Eddie’s going to rush at him. He looks vulnerable, like he just woke up from a nightmare, wet hair and pajamas and glasses sliding down his nose, refusing to make eye contact. He sighs heavily. “OK, don’t hate me, but—“

“Is that a yes?” Eddie says it way more sharply than he means to, but this is kinda high stakes stuff here.

“Yes. It’s the Kissing Bridge in Derry. Those are our initials.”

Eddie’s going to combust. He takes a calming breath. “When did you even do this?”

“Uh. The first time was when your arm was broken when we were kids. And then again when you were in the hospital.”

“Why?”

“Oh my god, Eddie, don’t make me say it, come on, man.”

“Dude, I need to know what you’re thinking because if you’re fucking with me I swear to god—“

“How could I possibly be fucking with you right now? That picture’s from like, six months ago.”

“Just answer the question, Richie, for fuck’s sake.”

“Because I had a big gay crush on you as a kid and then when I saw you again I realized it never went away and now I’m actually in big gay love with you and when you almost died it fucked me up. So I went to see if the carving was still there and it was and it was like the bridge remembered you even when I didn’t so I redid it and took a picture so I wouldn’t forget you again.”

Eddie’s chest is swelling up like one of Pennywise’s traumatizing balloons, but in the most positive way possible, getting bigger with every word that comes pouring out of Richie's mouth. He texts the picture to his own phone while Richie tries to compose himself, and then he throws the phone to the side. It’s time. _Come on in, the water's fine._

“You’re in big gay love with me?” he asks, advancing on Richie, who looks like he’s thinking of throwing himself out the window.

“Yeah but like, it’s fine, you don’t have to—“

He can’t finish that stupid sentence because Eddie’s finally kissing him. God, it’s good. He tastes like toothpaste and smells like Eddie’s body wash because he was too lazy to unpack his own. When Richie finally realizes what’s happening and kisses back, Eddie’s halfway into delirium, and by the time Richie licks into his mouth, he’s fully there. He’s kissing Richie with a primal need, the messiest and most unrestrained he’s ever felt. Richie’s tender and careful, his grip on Eddie is soft. Still trying so hard to give Eddie what he needs. What Eddie needs is more friction. He needs to feel Richie’s skin beneath his hands. He needs to see Richie’s dick and make him feel good.

“Mmmmm fuck,” Richie moans, breaking away, and Eddie smiles like a fucking dweeb. _Eloquent._ Richie babbles endearments laced with profanity and kisses and licks and nibbles Eddie’s neck and ears and lips and ruts his hips up against him. Eddie’s never been happier.

“You fucking asshole,” Eddie says. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I’m an idiot.”

Eddie bites Richie’s lower lip and Richie bucks up again involuntarily. _Good to know._ He grinds down against Eddie’s thigh and Eddie’s mouth waters. He squeezes Eddie’s ass and Eddie feels a headrush. “Jesus!”

“No, it’s me, Richie.” Eddie shoves Richie back against the wall, laughing, and finally rubs his cheek against Richie’s stubble. The scrape is absurdly pleasing, don’t ask him why.

“You need to shave.”

“I’m a little busy now, Eds.” Another squeeze. This one brings their dicks into contact through their pants and Eddie’s breath whooshes out of his lungs. “Up.” He picks Eddie up, and Eddie wraps his legs around Richie’s waist, like he’s imagined a hundred times. The last time Richie carried him, he was dying, and now he’s never felt so alive. The only real way to show his gratitude is to kiss Richie more. Richie practically throws him onto the couch and straddles Eddie’s lap with his ridiculously delicious thighs. He pulls Eddie closer by his tie, and Eddie gets even harder.

He needs to be on top. He needs to touch Richie’s skin and see those thighs again, the entire length of them.

“Dude, switch spots with me, you’re gonna pull a muscle.”

“OK, but the pants are coming off.”

“Good.” Eddie practically launches himself at Richie’s waistband to pull the sweatpants down. Richie’s _huge._ The struggle they have to work through to get each other’s clothes off slows him down so he’s a little more in control. He still has enough presence of mind to be insecure about his scar, though, and he hates it, but there it is. Richie hasn’t seen it in a long time, and he doesn’t want it to interfere with what they’re doing now. Next time he’ll take his undershirt off. This time he pushes Richie down, sinks to his knees, and eagerly latches onto Richie’s cock. It’s Eddie’s first time doing this, and he’s been fantasizing about it for months now. It’s different than he imagined but _wonderful._ Richie’s helpless. It’s messy and animalistic and perfect. And it can only get better as he gets better at it. That’s the beautiful part. Right now he has no idea what he’s doing and Richie’s still praising him like he’s the LeBron James of cocksucking. This is power. Eddie always thought he’d pull off, but when Richie says he’s going to cum, he lets him do it in his mouth. He reflexively spits it out. Swallowing can happen later, once he’s more used to it.

Richie pulls Eddie’s hair once he stops panting long enough to say, “Get the fuck up here,” and Eddie straddles Richie’s lap. Their teeth clash and Richie’s still breathing hard and can’t control his muscles because he’s still trembling. He licks his hand and grabs Eddie’s dick and Eddie bites Richie’s collarbone to avoid shouting. It feels so good it hurts, like he can’t even process that he’s getting what he’s wanted for so long and his brain won’t accept that it’s happening. Richie’s voice is low and rumbling in his ear, talking dirty, and that’s another thing he excels at. He doesn’t use porn clichés, and Eddie’s glad, because he hates porn dialogue. It’s unnatural and fake and Richie is unfiltered and heartfelt. He calls him sweetheart again, and _Jesus,_ that’s a thing he didn’t know would be so effective on him. Richie’s jacking Eddie off slower than Eddie does it himself, and he’s right, it’s better. He’s going to last longer and cum harder. He humps up into Richie’s hand frantically, but Richie’s steady, perfectly in control, and that makes Eddie crazy.

“You ready to cum for me?” Eddie moans and does. He didn’t think he could do that on command. He’s learning so much about himself.

Bone-deep satisfaction suffuses Eddie’s body. He lets go completely and puts his full weight on top of Richie. They kiss leisurely now, like they’ve got all the time in the world.

Richie runs his hands over Eddie’s back underneath his shirt. Eddie tries not to wince when he feels Richie’s fingertips over his scar. It’s stupid to be insecure about it, he knows that, he knows Richie knows what it looks like, and how he got it—he actually saw it happen—but he’s still self-conscious.

“I bet it looks pretty fucking badass,” Richie mutters, his touch soft.

“You should see the other guy,” Eddie says.

“No thanks, I’m good.”

The door buzzes and Eddie nearly jumps out of his skin. _Ha, oh right, they ordered food._

Eddie retrieves Richie’s glasses and the shirt Richie was wearing and had wiped them off with, and he goes to clean up while Richie takes care of the delivery. He catches a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror and he looks exactly how he feels: utterly wrecked and thrilled about it.

He dresses in some of Richie’s clothes and Richie looks at him like he’s just proposed. They sit down with their plates at the other end of the couch. Richie makes him recreate the middle finger picture he’d tried to take and sets it as his lockscreen. Eddie shows Richie his own phone. The Kissing Bridge picture is now his lockscreen. “I sent it to myself.”

Richie ducks his head bashfully. _Cute cute cute._ “You weren’t supposed to see that. Remember when I told you about the deadlights?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s what was gone. I didn’t see any funerals. I went to the bridge and the carving wasn’t there. I re-carved it and the wood just erased it. In that one we left your body down there, so you were completely gone. It fucked me up, man.”

“Hey. Thanks for not leaving me down there,” Eddie says. An understatement. He interlocks his fingers with Richie’s and kisses the back of his hand. He doesn’t say the words “I love you,” but he doesn’t need to right now. (He says it later, when they’re in the same bed, trying and failing to fall asleep. It’s completely unprompted, he just feels it and says it. Richie looks overwhelmed.)

“You’re welcome. This worked out pretty well but I was gonna tell you in a much cooler way.”

 _Yeah, I’ll bet._ “How?”

“I hadn’t figured it out yet.”

“When?”

“I didn’t have a set deadline. Before you moved out.”

“You suck at planning.”

Richie doesn’t even try to deny it. “True.”

“I think you would’ve chickened out,” Eddie says, and Richie’s outraged reaction is fucking hilarious.

“Motherfucker, I called a demon clown from outer space a sloppy bitch to his ugly fucking face, I don’t chicken out of anything.”

“Big deal, I threw a fence spike through its chest.”

“I literally killed a man, compared to that talking about feelings is like--”

“Really fucking scary,” Eddie says, and Richie laughs in agreement.

“He used to taunt me about being gay,” Richie says. “That piece of shit clown.”

“Fuck, did he?”

“Yeah man, he was a real asshole about it.”

 _No wonder it took Richie so long to come out and confess._ Eddie had been scared out of his mind and he didn’t even have the psychic damage of homophobic terror clowns to deal with. “Shit, dude, that sucks. I was just really repressed, that fucking clown didn’t have anything to do with it.”

Richie makes Eddie give him a high-five to celebrate their shared personal growth, like a nerd.

Eddie’s bedroom returns to being the guest room. The nightmares stop.

The following month is easily the best one in Eddie’s life. They decide not to tell the others right away, so they can savor it a bit longer. They lie in bed and compare notes on which Loser knew what and when.

“When did you realize you were in love with me?” Eddie asks.

“As a kid or an adult?”

“Jesus. Both.”

“As a kid? When we were 10 and I saw some dudes kissing on TV and I was like, ‘Huh. That’s cool. I should do that with Eddie.’ Of course it was some AIDS report about how gay dudes were dying so that fucked me up for a while, looking back.”

“Aw, man.”

“As an adult, my heart says right before I struck the gong at the restaurant, but it was actually when shit started going down with the fortune cookies and I was like, ‘Fuck, I gotta get Eddie out of here.’ Not ‘I need to get out of here,’ but ‘I have to protect Eddie because that’s what I do.’”

“That is what you do.”

“And I love doing it. When did you know?”

“When did I know or when did I finally admit it to myself?”

“Either. Both.”

“I knew when you told me I was brave even though I had just stood there screaming about wanting to go home while you were suffocating under a monster spider. I didn’t actually say the words to myself until—OK, do you remember that time we made waffles and you kept forgetting to take them out of the wafflemaker until they were burned and I tallied how many you ruined on the fridge board?”

“Yeah.”

“That was when. I was like, ‘Holy shit, I want to kiss this dumbass. I want that to be the reason he burns the waffles.’”

“Yeah, I had no idea. I’m just bad at cooking.”

“You were trying so hard and you kept fucking it up because you were too excited to talk to me about whatever the fuck, _Sesame Street_ or something.”

“The Muppets. Vincent Price on _The Muppets_.”

“Right. And it was hilarious. And I wanted to do that every morning.”

“I can burn your food every day if you want,” Richie says, kissing him.

“You wouldn’t even remember to eat something you could burn every day if I didn’t remind you. You’d just live off of Funyuns.”

“That’s true. Who asked you about us first?”

“Mike.”

“Mine was Bill. When we were in the waiting room after you got out of surgery. I told him to shut the fuck up. When did Mike ask?”

“Um, like, immediately. He’s the secret keeper, it’s some librarian magic shit, I didn’t even know I was telling him until after I’d said it. He was like, ‘Are you in love with Richie?’ and I was like, ‘Fuck, like maybe, I don’t think so but kinda?” and then three months later I’m like, “Holy shit, I’m in love with Richie.’”

“Yeah, he called me out too. Like, day of, at the hospital. He drove me to the hotel to take a shower and I didn’t even let him finish his before I went back to you and I was like, ‘Shit, he knows, he definitely knows.’ And then he came back into the waiting room and saw me pacing so much I was sore the next day and he just kinda went like this.” Richie pats Eddie on the shoulder sympathetically. “And I was like, ‘Goddammit.’ Remember with the coffee beans?” Eddie snorts. “I called him and freaked the fuck out.”

“Bev knew at that point and I texted her all about it. That’s when I knew you had it just as bad as I did.”

“That’s impossible, I was so smooth.” Eddie laughs loudly and pointedly. “Ben knew then too. And not because of Bev either, I don’t think, he just figured it out.”

“Sensitive poet/artist sixth sense bullshit, of course he’d see right through us. I told Bev after Myra said she thought I was cheating on her with you. Bev asked me point-blank instead of talking around it like everyone else.”

“Classic Bev.”

“Do you want to tell them in person?”

“Yeah. Maybe at Mike’s coming home thing next month.”

So that’s what they do. The Losers rag on Richie’s obliviousness until Mike completely betrays Eddie and tells them all about the wedding ring thing he did when he was fresh out of surgery. Richie looks dumbstruck.

“Babe, you really did that? You were so doped up, how did you even think of that?”

Eddie shrugs, blushing furiously. “I wanted to see you. I wanted you there.”

Richie kisses him and then announces he’s eventually going to propose to Eddie and Eddie, for once in his life, doesn’t feel any fear at all at the prospect of a huge change.

It doesn’t happen until over a year later, after Richie came out publicly (via tweet on New Year’s Eve, _shut up, Richie_ ) but before the two-year marker of Eddie’s impalement. It’s intimate and perfect. Eddie’s been carrying around a ring since before they went to the Pride march, just in case he found a good opportunity to turn the tables on Richie, but in the end, he lets Richie decide when the time is right. He can have this one. 

**Author's Note:**

> I still want a good mobile Pizza Rat game. 
> 
> I hope you and your loved ones are all safe, and that this took your mind off the quarantine and riots and dumpster fire of 2020.


End file.
